Tales of the Tea Shop: Katara's Broken Heart
by Eduard Tubin
Summary: Katara discovers that a cute Earth Kingdom guy is married and is cheating scum and takes her vengeance. Azula tries to teach Karo to use lightning. In the end both efforts end in a kind of compromise.


**Tales of the Tea Shop**

**Katara Joins the Broken Hearts Club**

"Nickelodeon movies never have a gay subtext." Azula reminded Karo as they watched an animated short film where ravens and a peacock sang cheery songs as they roosted on a telegraph wire. Plot did not matter as much as animation or loud singing and vague racial slurs.

"The peacock is gay – I swear it." Karo took a deep drink from his theater expensive urine colored fizzy soda that tasted almost but not quite like lemon. "Script writers try to sneak it in between the lines of the script because many writers are gay. A known fact this."

"In a Nickelodeon animated short?" Azula rolled her eyes. "Last time we watched a movie here you accused the script writers of being communists."

"Those animated bunnies were singing the International." Karo stated bluntly. "And rabbits live collectively in communities called warrens."

"You should major in Earth Kingdom Literature." Azula had a theory that much of what people read into literature did not in fact exist and that in writing Modernist Fiction that claimed great symbolic depth the author was in fact having one over on his audience. Karo assumed that most authors wrote for the money they earned from selling books and symbolism in literature amounted to a sophisticated sales gimmick.

"This animation fad will never last." Karo held onto his cup of soda. "You can't tell important and interesting stories with simple cartoon drawings."

"You had the same reaction when they added sound to film and fired the organist." Azula snickered. "You said patrons would miss the organist and the charm she brought to the theater. Now that skilled employee dispenses overpriced popcorn to paying customers."

The main feature started with a blazing fanfare that signaled the onset of a movie – the theater speaker system reproduced it with poor definition and tinny sound. This particular Nickelodeon belonged to a chain of such theaters operated by the Green Fire Theater Concern and the company built their theaters to a simple plan – dingy tan interior and dark brown carpet and enough seating for around four hundred souls. _This Island Earth_ promised a science fiction odyssey which turned into a very B grade movie with bad special effects. The flying saucer consisted of two paper plates painted silver and stuck together with glue and made to fly tethered on the end of a string.

"We have free movie passes and we pick a month where they release only crap." Azula complained about halfway through the movie.

"But you must admit that the sheer awfulness has a certain charm to it." Karo had a weakness for campy anything. Azula knew him as a repository for any show tune ever penned by human hands yet could not remember first year calculus.

"Oh the awfulness of that movie." Azula followed Karo out of the theater into the early evening sunshine. They had a five minute walk to the Zhao home and in recent weeks they had arrived to witness some of Katara's wilder Water Tribe cuisine so Karo stopped off for some real fried take out food.

"Isn't that Uichi Junior?" Karo pointed out of the window of a restaurant called Fat Choy's House of Food. He stood at the dark wood take out counter as Azula waited to placed her order and kept ringing the bell. "And an Earth Kingdom chick in the green Capri pants?"

"I suck at remembering faces." Azula followed Karo's hand as he pointed across the street. "Cute girl though."

"We tell our patrons to ring for service." A man in his mid twenties wearing a tan vest with a dark green shirt appeared behind the counter and removed the bell. "Ring as in ring once – not over and over."

"Karo?" Azula turned and found Karo had left and gone outside to confront Uichi Junior.

"Hi Uichi?" Karo said plainly.

"Kokaro?" Uichi had his arms around the Earth Kingdom girl. "I guess you caught me."

"Karo – its Karo." Karo had not expected a confession as Azula seldom if ever gave them and had prepared for a rather convincing lie. The quick confession came as a shock to him. "And this is your sister?"

"His wife...Keiko." The girl looks about twenty, had long chestnut brown hair and looked taller than Katara by a few inches.

"I got you something." Azula handed a paper bag off to Karo. "Uichi has a sister?"

"Wife." Karo nodded as Uichi and Keiko stood facing him.

"Wife?" Azula pointed a thin finger at Keiko. "Isn't he dating Katara?"

"Now that you mention it – yes." Karo said nervously.

"Does Katara know he has a wife?" Azula looked at Karo.

"No." Karo shrugged. "No... Oh how not nice."

"Oh." Azula looked at Uichi Junior and his eyes narrowed. "Well I have a problem don't I?"

"You?" Karo noticed Uichi remained silent, his wife looked angry and he had the distinct feeling that Uichi Senior would soon lose a son or parts of one.

* * *

"Do you want to taste my baked blubber nuggets?" Katara greeted her friends as they entered the kitchen.

"No!" Karo said bluntly and then softened the blow with an apologetic 'thank you'.

"Blubber of what?" Azula asked bluntly.

"Walrus blubber in a delicate breaded coating." Katara smiled sweetly and sounded like a waitress selling the 'dish of the day'. "Of course I had to make some changes to the recipe because I had to use a gas stove."

"This place has begun to smell like the hold of a fishing trawler after the refrigeration system went south." Azula picked up the red tea pot and lifted the lid but found it empty. "Where did Lady Zhao go?"

"She went out to play bridge with friends." Karo dropped the brown bag on the dining room table.

"Uichi will be here soon." Katara pushed Karo and Azula out of the kitchen. "You eat your unhealthy fried food. I will finish baking the blubber nuggets and Uichi and I will eat and then go out for a long walk in the park."

"Tell her." Azula kicked Karo in the shin and he jumped.

"I have something to tell you." Karo said quietly. Fries, my Komodo Chicken Three Piece Meal with garden salad." Karo pulled out each paper box from the paper back with a sort of pride. "Your spring rolls and salad."

"_Fat Choy_?" Katara read off the side of the box.

"Get on with it." Azula sounded irritated as she pulled out the two extra fizzy root beers and they both sat down surrounded by paper boxes, chopsticks and paper napkins.

"When they hang people they give the condemned criminal a last meal." Karo turned and faced Katara. "I fear what you might do when we tell you we met Uichi outside of _Fat Choy's_ and umm well we have to tell you something."

"Okay! We saw Uichi and he has a wife." Azula blurted out. "You still have a better looking booty – he has a wife named Keiko."

"Thank you." Katara patted Azula on the shoulder and then patted Karo on the back. "At least I know you guys care about me."

"Um Katara." Karo said as he watched Katara turn off the oven. She left the kitchen and walked out the front door without saying a word. Karo and Azula heard a metal clang out in the street as the tin hat on the chimney struck the ground.

Karo and Azula looked at each other for a long moment.

"Full moon tonight?" Azula asked quietly.

"According to the paper – yeah" Karo picked up the paper and looked at the weather forecast printed on the front page. "Uichi is dead meat isn't he?"

"A safe bet that we'll be eating human gonads at some point this evening." Azula wore a disgusted look on her face.

* * *

"Katara?" Karo sat with Azula drinking tea and fidgeting with the tin chimney hat he had found in the street. Both of them heard the sound of a scuffle out the front door as Katara bashed Uichi's head against the door.

"Why does he look like he's had a stroke?" Azula watched the action at the front door. Uichi collapsed on the floor with Katara making evil gestures with her hand.

"I will have a talk with Uichi Junior in the basement." Katara made stabbing gestures and Uichi marched forward and down the stairs like a blood and flesh marionette.

"Ask him if he can put the metal hat back on the chimney." Karo held out the piece of metal. "It keeps rain – ow! Do you have to punch me all the time?"

"I want you to pay attention. She can control a person with her bending?" Azula marveled. "What power – I love that woman."

"You will have to arrange for a conjugal visit in prison if she kills him." Karo plopped the metal hat down on the table with a clang. "We have to stop her before she goes to far."

"Can't we let her hurt him a bit?" Azula sipped her tea. "Uichi lied to her and treated her like garbage. I have my differences with Katara but I do enjoy it when she shows her powers."

"When did lying start to bother you?" Karo began to descend the stairs.

"It doesn't – when in doubt lie – but in this case he showed disrespect for Katara." Azula followed behind Karo and saw him cringe when Uichi screamed.

"Please don't kill me!" Karo heard Uichi plead. Karo noticed the basement floor covered ankle deep in warm water.

"Can I get some popcorn?" Azula grinned.

"Katara?" Karo found Katara hovering over Uichi who writhed in pain on the floor. His feet grew cold as Katara made a dance like movement and he froze in place about a meter from the gas boiler and next to the struggling Uichi. Uichi reminded Karo of a fly caught in a spider web. "I begin by saying 'please let me go and don't kill Uichi.' I end by asking if you have any reason to freeze me to the floor?"

"Katara?" Azula slid across the basement but steadied herself against a pile of boxes piled up against the wall nearest the stairs. "I love this side of you."

"Oh great!" Karo felt his feet growing cold in his boots. "Tell the gun toting man that he's a good shot."

"Why did you cheat on your wife with me!?" Katara said in a tone that demanded a well thought out answer.

"I never met a woman as beautiful as you and I lost my head because I do love you." Uichi answered in an exhausted tone.

"She has that booty we all know and love and those blue eyes that make me melt." Azula said as she hung onto the boxes. "But hurting another person is wrong – did I say that? That isn't me."

"Please Katara!" Karo begged. "We know you are better than this. You are a wonderful person full of human warmth and caring. Yes Azula I know I am maudlin I know but again I find myself frozen to the floor and I may have to have my toes cut off when they die of frostbite."

"Quit rambling!" Azula scolded.

"This man has no moral soul and has done this before. I can tell!" Katara yelled in a manner which would have made Karo jump if he could move and did make Azula jump.

"Get your revenge the traditional way women have always sought revenge." Azula began to slide across the floor as she let go of the boxes. She looked like a neophyte skater as she struggled to keep her balance on the smooth ice. "Steal his wallet, drain his bank account, buy lots of things you want and ruin his credit rating."

"I love powerful women." Uichi said in a hoarse voice. "Katara has this great power."

"Uichi?" A voice Karo and Azula recognized as Keiko's came from the upstairs. "I saw you enter this house with that woman! I want a divorce!"

"Oh sure! Walk right in!" Azula wobbled as she tried to stand up. "Why didn't any of you guys think to lock the front door? Walk on down to the basement! You will find Uichi down here with _that woman_."

"Uichi do you ever wonder if your life is a karmic joke?" Karo could see Katara had calmed down slightly but he still remained frozen to the floor. Keiko had worked out a strategy to cross the ice covered floor by using the copper water pipes to steady herself. Azula smacked her forehead since Keiko had come up with such a simple means to cross the floor without looking like a complete idiot. Keiko walked right up to Uichi and kicked him in the stomach.

"I want a divorce!" Keiko kicked him again, dropped a yellow piece of paper on him and left. Uichi coughed for a moment and Katara released the ice, turned the water to mist and the basement dried instantly.

"Get up!" Katara commanded and pointed to the front door. Uichi needed no encouragement and Keiko followed behind him and kept trying to kick him somewhere vital. "Leave!"

"What does the paper say?" Azula looked over Karo's shoulder as he picked up the paper.

"Before you begin digging your husband's grave in the backyard consider a free visit to Pon and Daihong Attorneys at Law – Divorce Law Our Specialty." Karo read out loud.

* * *

"Publish or perish?" No wait that applies to academic work." Karo had come to the back of the tea shop mid morning the next day and found Azula practicing her fire bending forms. While still late spring it felt like a warm summer day – the garden had a full compliment of flowers and the grass looked lush and green. "You want to teach me to use 'lightning'?"

"With Katara sulking in her room and with your mom complaining that you have nothing to do; I thought we ought to work on your fire bending." Azula put her hands on her hips and lectured like a stern professor. "You can fire bend but you must seize your power and learn to guide it as a master of fire bending form!"

"They arrest you for seizing your power in public don't they?" Karo watched as Azula motioned and despite the fact she did not unleash her lightning attack his hair stood on end. "I enjoy electricity in small amounts but what makes you think I can unleash large quantities of electrons and control them?"

"Nothing. Only a few rare fire benders in the line of Roku can do this. You and I come from that line but you won't know if you can use lightning until you try." Azula placed Karo's arms in position like a baseball coach teaching pitching. "Lightning requires emotional control and great strength. You make one mistake and you could die."

"Open or closed casket funeral?" Karo knew that Azula had begun to guide him through the motions of separating the great power of lightning and he could feel a surge of strange tingling power as she did so.

"Gooey!" Azula replied. "You can do this if you have the gift. If you don't you will only make a puff of smoke and a loud bang. Quit thinking about the risk. Everyday you could die if you made a mistake but you learned how to avoid them. You look both ways before crossing the street but one mistake and a carriage crushes you. I can teach you how to use lightning if you have that talent and to control it so you won't get hurt. Using lightning requires that you use your body to unbalance the force of fire in the air and then guide it. You use your body as a channel."

Karo understood electricity as best anyone in his time could. Lighting he knew came from the separation of positive and negative charges. He knew at a particular point the difference became so great that a great spart leaped across the air to balance the forces. Anyone caught in between the balancing of forces did not have a good day.

"Now do the same motions exactly as I showed you." Azula crossed her arms and stood back. Karo breathed in deeply and he began the slow moves and could feel the power surge through him as his slowly parted the positive and negative charges in the air. He found it easy – at his core Karo believed in a cold and rational view of the world – he could imagine taking electrons from the air and collecting them to guide through his body. He took deep breaths and imagined the standing waves of electrons rushing toward his two fingertips as he pulled in. In a final jab he let a bolt of lightning flow from his fingertips as he thrust out.

_Caw! Caw!_ _Kaboom!_

Thirty meters over Ba Sing Se a large raven exploded into a heap of ashes and feathers that drifted down over Karo and Azula. Azula didn't know whether to laugh or feel pride in her protege as she brushed off black feathers from her shoulder. She found this impressive despite the fact Karo lacked control, the lightning looked weaker than hers and he had flown back three meters and struck the wall of the garden. He had killed a crow, had no accuracy but he could use lightning.

"The Animal Cruelty People will start sending you letters." Azula said coldly.

"What happened out here?" Uncle Iroh rushed out the back door to see a large circle of black feathers and nasty bits that had once been a well fed raven.

"I think the raven had a manufacturing defect." Azula turned to Uncle Iroh half expecting a lecture on the dangers of teaching the young and now stunned silent Karo how to use the 'cold fire'. She did not have to wait long.

"Azula!" Iroh said sternly. "You must teach Karo the control first so he won't hurt himself or others."

"Wow!" Karo stared at his still smoking fingers in astonishment. "Can you imagine how many slices of toast I could make at one time using lightning?"

"I know Iroh." Azula held her hand to her forehead. "Not a single loaf of bread is safe."

"Karo has a kind heart but must you teach him such a dreadful craft?" Iroh said sternly.

"Uncle Iroh?" Karo had a half dozen ravens pecking at his head and dive bombing him from all angles. "I would really like to know if crows possess some kind of bird intelligence?"

"Shoo!" Iroh shouted but the crows had Karo supine on the ground begging for his life. Azula threw flame bolts to scatter the crows, grabbed Karo and ran into the tea shop.

"I would say crows have evolved a high level of intelligence. The one you killed must have sent out a distress call." Azula sat Karo down. "Anyone can forgive and forget – you only need a religion, bad memory, brain damage or rampant senility. Revenge takes planning, courage, fortitude and skill."

"I have never seen birds so angry! We have dozens of screaming crows and I think they all want you dead." Iroh slammed the door shut and as he looked out he witnessed a kind of Hitchcock moment as black birds waited on the roof of the cottage, on the fence and in the trees with their beady little black eyes burning with hate.

"Maybe Katara can help." Azula patted Karo's shoulder. "When the crows kill you do you want your estate to go to a bird sanctuary?"

"Go find Katara." Iroh commanded.

"The ravens have taken to anything red!" Azula came back five minutes later brushing her hands over her head in panic. Katara ran in after her and rushed to the back of the tea shop. "I nearly lost an eyeball to a dive bombing squadron of those birds."

"I am so dead." Karo sighed.

* * *

"Do you know some scientists think birds evolved from dinosaurs." Azula watched a crow staring at her in the back window. The tea shop had seen no customers since crows had taken to screeching out of the sky and scaring off customers. Azula had become bored over the last three hours but each attempt to leave lead to a fiercer and fiercer attack from the crows.

"Thanks Azula." Karo had scratches on his face and small rips in his clothes and a healthy respect for the power of animal intelligence. "Helpful that."

"Any ideas Katara?" Azula walked to Katara who had decided to make tea.

"All men are scum." Katara dipped the tea ball in the boiling water. "If you didn't want a war why did you let Karo pick off a raven with lightning."

"Yes." Azula backed away. "I will take that on advisement."

"Well...again I have to save your royal butts because Karo is an idiot and you have no self restraint." Katara poured out a cup of tea and slammed the cup on the counter and broke the handle. "I have an idea. Give me an hour to gather some things and I will return."

"What do you plan to do to Uichi?" Azula spoke as Katara stormed out of the tea shop and slammed the door. "He won't pass for Karo – he has almost no hair."

"I have a desperately sinking feeling about this." Karo said quietly. "What if Katara ends up doing something rash and thoughtless."

"We have rash and thoughtless trademarked." Azula poured herself some tea and sipped calmly. "She has 'deadly water bender from hell' trademarked."

"I don't know." Iroh said calmly as he cleared away the broken cups.

"How do you tell a group of crows that you didn't mean to kill a member of their tribe?" Karo went to the window and the crow pecked violently at the window as he came close. Karo jumped back quickly and Azula handed him a cup of tea.

"They call it a 'murder of crows' not a tribe." Azula explained.

"How do I apologize and beg forgiveness?" Karo pointed out the window. "They want to kill me."

"Well we could try a phonecaw?" Iroh laughed. Only he saw the cosmic humor in the situation.

* * *

"Meet Mr Mannequin. I could only find on Azula's size: evidently they don't make a mannequin Karo's size." Katara did return an hour later. "He has no wife and no relatives and I think he will fit in Azula's clothes."

"And?" Azula raised her eyebrow and sneered. "He hardly qualifies as a he?"

"You own me twenty gold for the clothes mannequin and I think you can spare some clothes." Katara placed the mannequin in Karo's arms. "Is the cottage unlocked"

"Give me a few minutes to get one of Azula's outfits and we can sacrifice Karo."

"What do you think Karo?" Azula shut the door quickly when Katara left.

The crows took no interest in her at all and she made it to the cottage and returned by wrapping the red clothes in a green blanket. Azula opened the door and Katara dumped the green blanket with her clothes onto the ground.

"You are a deeply troubled woman. What does that _Far Side_ poster mean?'" Katara scolded. "Karo has several of them posted on his door and I never get the jokes."

"Which one?" Azula asked. "The one where the caption reads: God as a kid tries to make a chicken in his room?"

"I won't even ask. We have more important problems." Katara huffed and began to dress the mannequin.

"How will this fool the crows?" Karo helped Katara dress the mannequin.

"You know what the Fire Nation always said about the Water Tribe?" Katara unfolded a set of red pants – luckily Azula and Karo dressed alike.

"If it squirts ink eat it?" Azula stood back and watched the mannequin being dressed by Karo and Katara.

"Oh you have gotten on my last nerve honey!" Katara shook her finger at Azula. She had no patience after the 'Uichi Affair' and had a shorter temper than normal and she never did understand Azula's humor. Even worse for her the mild mannered Karo appeared to share the same dark and despairing humor. "We all look alike. Perhaps the crows think the same way about humans."

"I can't get this boot to fit." Karo struggled.

"Force it." Katara growled. "It's a Fire Nation boot – it only understands force."

"Looks like Zuko." Azula commented. "Without the scar."

"I call him Uichi of the Fire Nation." Katara said tartly. "Now we toss him out of the second story window. Come on Azula!"

The girls left with Uichi the Mannequin and a few moments later he hit the ground with a thump. What followed struck Karo as the avian equivalent of a public stoning. The crows flew to the mannequin and covered it with their black feathered bodies and began tearing it apart. Pieces of red cloth and the pink plaster used to make the mannequin filled the air and in moments the crows had scattered Uichi of the Fire Nation to the four corners of the lawn.

"See!" Azula patted Karo on the back. "I knew we could think our way out of this."

"I did the thinking." Katara reminded Azula. Iroh stood by the window entranced by the frenzy of crows and said nothing.

"What if they don't fall for it?" Karo felt a little queasy and a bit disgusted by what he had witnessed.

"It will make for another great Far Side cartoon." Azula assured Karo.

* * *

" I still feel miserable." Katara sat at Karo's desk as he rested. He had sustained no serious injury but the 'crow' incident left him badly shaken and he had taken to his bed for the rest of the day to read and ponder his close call with avian death. Azula had gone home to her cottage to ponder whether she could turn Karo into a lightning yielding death machine. The 'lightning yielding death machine part' proved less of a problem than trying to improve his accuracy.

"You feel miserable?" Karo lay in bed and spoke quietly. "I had crows plot to murder me. I will admit it would have been a unique way to go but I don't feel ready to go."

"I have the worst luck with men." Katara continued. "I have fallen in love many times, had a few serious relationships and failed at each one for various reasons."

"I got beaked a number of times in the back. I sense a metaphor." Karo lay on his back and stared at the ceiling. "You won't find your answer in despairing – it leads nowhere."

"What do you suggest?" Katara asked drearily.

"Oh yeah I have to suggest something." Karo had never proven good at counseling.

"No...not at all." Katara had trouble understanding Azula or Karo but asking them questions often proved most enlightening. Karo had a way of sounding stupid but providing insight because the fine details really never distracted him from the larger picture. Azula's arrogance, dark cynicism and evil nature could combine to created deep if not depressing insights into life. "What does that cartoon with 'God as a kid' mean. I never could understand it. I see a kid with a desk full of lab equipment, a heap of smoking ash and a room full of feathers. I don't get it."

"It pokes fun at the stubborn belief some people hold that the world came into being at one instant in time at the hands of a supernatural being rather than taking shape through geology and evolution over vast sums of time." Karo coughed and spat up a black feather. "God as a kid had to take time to get a chicken 'right' and his first attempt ended in utter failure with the chicken exploding. In reality evidence suggests that the chicken came about because of slow changes in its form to adapt it to the environment it lived in."

"I know how evolution works. I still don't get the _Far Side_ cartoon." Katara stared up at the cartoon and wondered if the dim gas lit lamp made it difficult to comprehend but she concluded she just didn't get 'nerd' humor.

"Maybe like God, you have to keep on trying to make your own chicken. It may blow up in your face but if you show determination eventually you will have your own chicken." Karo wondered if that constituted a real sentence or if he had finally fallen 'off the edge'. "I mean you are my age so don't despair yet if you haven't made your chicken – er found true love or a rich sugar daddy."

"Do they teach Sokka lessons at University?" Katara patted Karo's tired head. "That made sense in a way. In the same way my brother sometimes can make sense."

"Oh." Karo said.

* * *

_Bonk!_

"Ow!" Karo walked into a large pole with a figure of a Fire Nation noble stuffed with straw and festooned with what looked like multicolored Nepalese prayer flags. Karo had such a paranoid fear of the crows attacking him he had completely ignored the scarecrow. Again he couldn't blame the weather since another sunny day with white fluffy clouds hung over Ba Sing Se and the whatever Azula had made hid under cover of noon.

"Mutually Assured Destruction." Azula spoke calmly from the back window of the tea shop. "We haven't trained in five days so I decided to talk to the crows in the one language every intelligent creature understands – credible threats. We have much work to do and I can't have my star pupil cowering in his room."

"What do you mean?" Karo slunk low and hunkered down fearing he might have to hit the ground at any minute as he ran toward the cottage.

"I staged a few weapons tests." Azula calmly explained as she scanned the sky. "I knew they had strength in numbers so I demonstrated lightning as a weapon of mass destruction by blowing up a bloated ostrich horse carcass and blowing the tops off trees."

"I didn't kill it." Azula admitted. "I think it gave out on the main street and the driver just left it for the city to collect. The domestically made ones are no good anyway – as you know the old saying – Earth Kingdom ostrich horses – Found on the Road Dead."

"I didn't spend my time cowering in my room." Karo stood beside Azula at her cottage door. "I spent time talking with Katara about her sad life. I knew she lost her mother to a Fire Nation raid. I didn't know she had such bad luck with relationships."

"Why do we need straight men?" Azula took Karo out into the middle of the garden and he could see that the tall pine trees that faced the back of the garden had lost their crowns. "I mean Katara has it all – intelligence, grace and strength – and Uichi uses her like a cheap whore."

"Er..well she knows that part about being used." Karo began a series of motions tracing Azula's as he carefully watched her shape a fire bending form. "I thought we could take her out for a movie or a nice dinner."

"Watch your hands on the next move because this targets your flow of energy. Merely try to aim for the base of the crab-apple tree but do not release it." Azula cautioned. "I must teach you control! Control!"

* * *

"Come on Katara." Azula shouted through her door. "Karo and I want to invite you to an evening of entertainment and fine company. He will be bitching about his lost eyebrow but we can still have fun."

"I can't get the fake one to stick on!" Karo complained from his room. "I can show you how to lift off the ground with your fire bending you said. I said I still don't know. You said 'what could happen'?"

"I will admit you had a spectacular failure at liftoff but the tree broke your fall." Azula shouted back. "You sure Katara is in here?"

"How dangerous are your fire bending techniques?" Karo steadied his fake eyebrow hoping to achieve acceptable results.

"Well...very." Azula opened the door to Katara's room and bumped into Katara.

"I don't feel very social." Katara half pushed Azula out of the way as she came through the door. "Have you managed to kill Karo yet with your fire bending techniques?"

"The man loses one eyebrow and has half his clothes torn off and you'd think he had lived through a massive explosion that dug a meter deep hole in the ground and ripped off half his clothes." Azula followed Katara down the hall complaining all the way. "Karo has the talent to become a great fire bender but he lacks the fierce will to apply his powers."

"Iroh cautioned you about this didn't he?" Katara knocked on Karo's door. "He doesn't have the warrior spirit."

"Well..." Azula could not come up with something to say to respond to Katara. Deep down Azula knew Katara was right: Karo lacked her drive and determination and would never master his fire bending in the same manner as she had learned from her father.

"How do you feel Katara?" Karo kept patting he fake eyebrow.

"Alone and sad." Katara patted his shoulder. "How about you?"

"Sore but strangely alive." Karo patted Katara's hand gently. "I have started to reclaim some of my past?"

"Okay....lets find something fun to do." Azula said as she leaned against the doorway. Azula felt a brief moment of pride when she heard that from Karo.

* * *

"You let Katara pick the movie?" Azula sat at Karo's desk checking her face for pimples. "I wanted to see Krazy Kat the Animated Movie!'

"Maybe she does to?" Karo sat on the bed and brushed his hair back to tease it into the right configuration for the gold hair ornament. "Come on! It's her evening so let her pick the movie."

"Each Sunday we get the full page Krazy Kat cartoon. We read it and get the joke but she sits at the table with the comics section and says 'I don't get it'." Azula rebuffed Karo's hopeful statement.

"I picked a movie." Katara swept into the room. Karo finished tying off his hair and Azula had concluded the pimples had hidden in her hairline. "A romance about a young noble Earth Kingdom girl who falls in love with a humble Earth Kingdom soldier but her parents forbid them to marry."

"So no animated mice throwing bricks at cats then?" Azula swiveled in the chair.

"We find your pick most congenial." Karo tried to say over Azula's voice. "A romantic story would do us all some good – right?"

A half hour later Katara, Karo and Azula stood in the late evening twilight waiting to purchase tickets to the latest romance movie. All the women entering the Nickelodeon looked buoyant and happy, all the men and Azula looked as if lining up for prison chow. Karo asked the ticket seller for three tickets and then they entered the theater as the ticket ripper dude ripped them in two and dumped one half into a trashcan. The traditional purchase of snacks took another five minutes as the trio worked their way through the lineup to purchase the greasy snack and caffeinated food. Karo and Azula purchased small popcorn, a large box of malt balls each and the Bladder Buster Soda. Azula figured that frequent trips to the bathroom might spare her some of the movie. Katara found chocolate covered raisins and iced tea agreeable although the price was not.

"Why do they keep these places so dim?" Karo had to squint as he went from the brightly lit lobby full of colored lights showing all the tricks the 'new' electric light could accomplish into the belly of the dimly lit theater. Azula found her favorite seat in the center of the large theater. She hated the balcony because all the old people sat there and the balcony did not afford the best viewing angles – ushers also patrolled the balcony more often interrupting a critique of a badly made film with a stern hush and a flash of a torch to let her know they 'knew' who she was.

"I might have sworn I saw Uichi and a girl just take seats two rows ahead of us. I can recognize that short haired cranium anywhere." Azula pointed straight ahead. She stood up and walked down the aisle while Karo strained to overhear the conversation.

"I see you have had no problem finding another airhead?" Azula leaned over and whispered. "Someone you knew in high school?"

"I have become a renowned model and pose for calendars as well as work for Earth Rumble. I hold up the signs that announce each new match." The girl had donned a nice light blue silk dress and did look very attractive and voluptuous. "I met Uichi at the attorney's office. His wife and another woman beat him up."

"I see." Azula could see very little in the dim light but senses some unease in Uichi Junior. "Which calendars?"

"You wouldn't know about them." The model replied quietly. "Girls of Earth Rumble – Last years Calendar?"

"February?"

"How did you know?" The model sounds surprised.

"You are Lin. You were born in the Northern Water Tribe homeland. You like water sports, Kuai ball and a nice cup of tea." Azula stood and crossed her arms as she tapped her fingers. "You do look nice for thirty five. I collect those Earth Rumble Calenders."

"Why?" Both Uichi and the model asked at the same time.

"Cold winter nights and loneliness?" Azula spoke without hesitation. "Of course the touch up artists that put the calendar together didn't quite remove all traces of your C-Section scar and the stretch marks and varicose veins from your teenage pregnancy but the air brush artist can only do so much in a day."

"Oh!" Uichi stood up. "Excuse me."

"Why you savage Fire Nation bitch!" Lin yelled as she watched Uichi leave out the back exit. "How dare you!"

"Sweetness I saved you so much pain." Azula announced. "He would have dumped you when he saw those scars and he works construction so he can tell your age by counting the rings."

_Slap!_

"Have a cougar-iffic day!" Azula felt the soreness of a slap to the face settle in.

_Smack!_

Lin marched out of the front doors of the theater. Azula watched her leave and had to admit that she wore the tight blue dress very nicely.

* * *

"In the 'It Can Only Happen In Ba Sing Se' Column." Azula sat at the Pai Sho table with Karo and Katara and cleared her throat as she continued to read from the local newspaper. "Local son of famed contractor Uichi Senior turned up at a local hospital with unspecified injuries at around ten in the evening last night. According to him a team of Earth Rumble wrestling stars jumped him and beat him senseless. According to the attending emergency room physician Uichi Junior will recover and also have a promising future as a male soprano."

"In the days of yore." Karo remembered a painful lesson from music class. "The courts of the Earth Kings had great power and they had their own troupe of musicians and singers. The king had elaborate operas staged for his own entertainment. If a young boy showed particular talent in singing the king often had him castrated to preserve his beautiful voice forever. Such singers became known as Castrati. From this page of history we learn the lesson that you should never sing well in an elementary school play."

"Doesn't the Earth King have Palace Eunuchs?" Katara asked as she sat back in her chair and fiddled with the Pai Sho board.

"That teaches us the lesson that when applying for a position in the civil service you must pay close attention to what position you apply for." Azula had learned the intricate and arcane nature of the civil service under the Earth King. Civil service job postings hung in local post offices and most of the time consisted of the ordinary file clerks, administrators and various other pencil pushers. She knew that one position listed as a Clerk 2A was code for a Palace Eunuch. Such a position offered a very high salary, all the benefits except for maternity leave and child care. Even in her short stay she had met eunuchs that had achieved high position in the palace by ticking off the wrong box and not using a pencil. While seemingly barbaric; the use of Palace Eunuchs dis historically provide a job opportunity for all those who had obtained a Communications Degree from Ba Sing Se University.

"Why did you come over today?" Karo asked Katara. Katara had spent many days in her room upset about her bad luck with men but she had dressed and come along with Karo. "Feeling better?"

"Last night provided closure." Katara said softly. "In some way. I also wanted to train with you guys to keep my skills up and if need be put Karo's hair on fire should you two fire benders have another accident."


End file.
